a return and an exit

I told myself I had to either write emails or make a blog post, so HERE I AM. Sorry all emailers!

recent things:

I quit Comcast! Not one reason in particular - but I think it could be reduced correctly to, as a long-term customer, too much $$ and not enough service. The Internet led me to believe that this would be a torturous phone call where I would almost certainly have to yell or cry, but I didn't. The guy I talked to was nice and tried to talk me out of it (and I let him try for a little while - why not?) but was not a jerk when I stuck to my guns. Likewise returning equipment at the Comcast office was easy. IN FACT, by not being the total garbage monsters I feared,  it's possible I would consider doing business with them in the future. Anyway. I know it sounds dumb to say this was hard, but this was hard. I had to change email addresses on a million things (I had comcast mail before gmail ever existed), etc. but I think it's mostly done now. Whew!





What else has been going on? Everything and nothing like always. I'm still happily working for the library. Like anywhere, there are people and situations that make me think I'm losing my mind, but for the 99% most part, I love it.

Something else I love - this APP that makes double exposures of your pictures. IT'S SO FUN. I have a million of these and it's all I can do to not post them all. For .99 you can get the watermark to go away, but you can use it for free with some ads. (This photos is yellow raspberries + some giant tree in the forest+ a koolaid color scheme and it makes me giddy in a very specific way.) It will combine randomly or you can compose your exposures. I like the randomness factor, but I think you can have fun with it however you like.

TIME FOR BED. I'm reading a book that I want to get back to: Bellwether by Connie Willis. It was written in the 90s and the main character  (Sandy Foster) studies fads. So interesting! The guy (Bennett O'Reilly) whom the author goes to great lengths to describe as having no style at all in his too short corduroys, canvas sneakers, and wildly patterned shirts (compared to the nikes+ bomber jacket + jeans of the "cool guys") would be unquestionably fashionable in 2015 Portland Oregon. Fickle fashion!

summer things

HELLO AUGUST!

So far August is hot and humid
and let's say d r y
busy but also vacation
ETC.

SOME AUGUST THINGS:

• I ordered a mattress from the internet and I love it. (old mattress was like trying to go to sleep but instead having a tiny monster made of springs softly punch me with its rock fists.) More on this in the future, in case you also have a mattress monster punching you with rock fists. 
• that panorama beach picture above that doesn't quite fit is from July.
• I've been listening to Rock Steady by No Doubt for the first time in ages.  SO MANY HITS. 

TOMATO TIME. They're coming on heavy right now. It's at least this many every other day.




Pretty little butterfly that came to visit. I like to think it's because of my bee/butterfly watering station, but let's be honest: it's probably the flowers.

Bee/butterfly watering station: take a dish (I used a regular old terra cotta flower pot saucer) fill it with rocks (I used agates and jasper and whatever else I dragged home from the beach) and then fill it with water! The rocks give those bees/butterflies a place to stand to get a drink. I'm having to rescue fewer bees from the birdbath! Downside: the cat LOOOOVES drinking from it so I have to fill it up at least twice a day. But it makes me feel good to do something for these little guys in this punishing heat.

hens and chicks

I just realized that the cute little white border I put on this picture is useless with my white background. Oh well. This is a hen and chick plant (sempervivum tectorum)  in bloom. It's awfully pretty, but the blooms are not actually a great sign  - the plant flowers before it DIES. I think that just means the individual hen, though. Anyway - these are in a pot and too crowded so that's probably the issue. Why not go out with a bang? They're beautiful. 

ANYWAY. In book news, I'm still reading The Sisters about the Mitfords. It has been Mitford city around here - talking about it at work (it's for book group AT work), looking up Mitford pics on the internet, etc. What are you reading? Oh! I've also been listening to the audiobook version of a Rivers of London book. I'm so far behind on my reading challenge for this year I'm forgoing podcasts and listening to books while I tend to the garden, etc. It's so easy to download them from the library! 

artificial mystery flavor

1. Today was the Junior Rose Festival parade! It's the oldest/largest children's parade in the country, and it goes right by my work. I got to watch a bit of it from a great vantage point in the meeting room while we waited for meeting attendee #4, who got stuck in a parade morass and never made it. (He was warned but did not heed the warning! HEED IT, PEOPLE. It's all fun and games until someone gets stuck behind a pack of 4th graders on unicycles.)
2. 
   
3. this picture is from I don't even know when but I took it, I like it, I'm using it. 
4. I'm playing around with the numbers feature here. I don't like it all bunched together, so there may be some blank space.
5. or not.
6. 
   
7. I left work an hour early today due to incipient migraine. The weather has been whipsawing back and forth between bright/warm and cloudy/rain/cold. In either state my head is fine, it's just when it's moving from one to the other that I have problems.  I am having many problems this spring. 
8. I'm reading a book about the Mitford sisters called, strangely enough, The Sisters. It's SO DENSE and slow going, but totally enjoyable. Things are picking up now that the sisters are old enough to start having disreputable affairs and shocking politics. 
9. It's for book group. 

blooming like whoa

Maybe as I get back into this, I can sneak in a new habit like, say, not waiting till midnight to start! The iris are blooming like WHOA in the garden right this very minute, although this picture is from Saturday.

dinosaur days

hellooooooo

Greetings from my dinosaur friend and also from me.

Flickr has done another big update which makes it easier for me to find GEMS LIKE THIS from my photos. I look forward to posting more of them. In the meantime, let's make up stories about what dinosaur friend is doing. I think she's from dinosaur island and is breathing out a giant cloud to confuse shorter, non cloud-breathing dinosaurs who were making a bad argument about something important to tall dinosaurs.

long week

Missed some days! It's been busy and I've been tired. (translation: I am obsessed with a dumb hidden object game.) It's not all been hidden object games, though. This week has included a lot of fun extracurriculars, but if I ever needed proof or reminders that I'm an introvert who needs time to just chill out,  this week has provided it! (I never needed proof or reminders, but I guess it's reassuring to confirm what I already knew?) I left the house exactly once today and it was LOVELY to just stay in and be quiet. (translation: sing along badly to my ipod.) Anyway - I work again Saturday and then two days off!! Woooooooo!!!!! 

this picture is from almost exactly one year ago - I had Absolute Sandman vol. 1 checked out from the library and snapped this picture to mark my place between a bunch of very similar photos I was taking for my etsy shop. 

mountain time

Is it gross bad manners to post a picture of a sunny day when so much of the country is iced and snowed? If so, I apologize. I had to go to a short (SUPER BORING) meeting today in the Multnomah Building, but the plus side of it all was I got to be outside when I would normally be inside and it was AMAZING. This is from the sky bridge connecting the Multnomah Building to its parking lot. 

And here's what it looks like facing the other direction - the onramp to the Hawthorne bridge and a partial view of downtown. Why do you suppose that guy is walking backwards on the bridge in the bike lane buffer? Why not use the sidewalk? I just noticed him now. Anyway. Time for bed! I stayed up wayyyyy to late last night watching Key & Peele videos on youtube. (Read the Zadie Smith profile of them in the New Yorker - it's really good!) 

videos on boats is what we need!

Yeah, I heard this on the new Android commercial and I LOVED IT and looked it up and here it is.

< 3 u, eyepatch guy

it makes me happy. 

spangled

Just a spangly picture for tonight.

mystery books

The teen council at the library did a "blind date with a book" project. They wrapped them up and wrote a hint/personal ad for the book and put them on display. It's pretty cute! Several of them have already gone out. With our system, they can be checked out without unwrapping, which helps preserve the mystery! I haven't checked any out* but maybe I will!

* because my to-read stack is too tall! On the docket: 

• Wolf Hall - still reading this. I love it, but it requires my full attention. The good news is the Thomas problem isn't as bad as it was in the beginning. (everyone is named Thomas!) 
• Saga vol. 4!! I'm so excited to read this! my hold came in and I've got to get it read, but also don't want to just read it in a hurry. 
• Get in Trouble by Kelly Link. BEYOND EXCITED for this one. I love her so much. My hold just came in from the library, but she's reading at Powell's on Wed, so maybe I'll just buy my own copy. 
• The Shadow Cabinet by Maureen Johnson - book 3 of her Shades of London series, which I love! The previous one left off in a very exiting way. 
• Exploding the Phone - for non-fiction book group. Very much looking forward to it! 
• Spear of Summer Grass by Deanna Raybourn. I almost forgot about this one because I checked it out digitally from the library so it's not in a visible stack right in front of me. I wanted to read it when it came out, but it got away from me. The Vaginal Fantasy book group just read it and renewed my interest. 
• Whispers Underground by Ben Aaronovitch. Book 3 of the Rivers of London series. love these books! (also a digital hold from the library.) 

what's on your book stack? 

this happens all the time

I check out a really cool book from the library, like this one: Le Notre's Gardens

then I leave it on the shelf until it's almost due without looking at it. It is the only copy in the system. Some other discerning individual has put it on hold, I cannot renew! 

I open it up and see beautiful pictures like this and kick myself for not looking sooner. It happens all the time. I'm trying to train myself to LOOK SOONER, but I'm not 100% on that just yet. 

Dynasty-era cover

I haven't read this one yet! I just learned, thanks to goodreads, that this is book 6 of M.M. Kaye's Death In... series. I just got up and counted and I have FIVE of them with these lamé-glamorous early eighties covers! I must have hit the jackpot at a library sale or used bookstore. I've only read Death in Zanzibar and Death in Kashmir - they were written in the 50s, published with these covers in the 80s (duh) and read by me in the 90s. As I recall, they feature plucky young ladies falling into  international adventures and being cleverer than the villain (who is usually handsome and/or charming as is the way of these books), which is to say the kind of story I like. 

Oh no! I just inspected the covers more closely, and my copy of Death in Zanzibar is from 1984 and therefore lacking the shiny metallic part and the heroine is wearing a jumpsuit. (an EIGHTIES JUMPSUIT.)  I'd better go to bed before I get myself too worked up about this discovery. 

rain walks are the best walks

1) it's when the dinosaurs come out (apparently)
2) sensible people remain indoors
3) which means I can meander and stop and start and do pretty much whatever I want without ruining things for a runner. So many runners!
4) I actually have the clothes for it! even though I want to replace almost all of them. I should say I have the right clothes for a rain walk in the 38 - 55 degree range. Above or below that I would be too cold/too hot/ unlikely to leave the house for a rain walk.
5) I want to start walking to work so I thought I should start practicing

one way and another

This is from Saturday as I was walking from the car to work. The light was so weird! This doesn't really capture it - the bright sun break glowed against the dark rain clouds. 

And here's the same sidewalk facing the other direction - this way you can see the blue sky (see it? it's there) that allowed for that sun break above. This was at 9 AM.

So I ALMOST made it 1) blogging every day and 2) not talking about it! But now I skipped a day and I'm talking about it. Martina and I decided to blog in february -  she's going for the Quality side of the street while I trade in Quantity. 

Anyway!! more to come! 

enjoy this tree sign

I have things to say but it all got away from me this evening. In the interim (between now when my thoughts are about SLEEPING and how much I love it and when my thoughts will be about anything else) please enjoy this picture of a tree sign. What are the trees of your region? We've got a lot in the PNW, but Douglas Fir and Western Red Cedar are our everyday majestic arboreals.

driver's license requirements are different in Iceland

Bjöööööööörrrrrkkkkk!
I don't know where to start. It's heartbreaking but then there's the cat (who is kind of an asshole!) and her cape/dress all-in-one, and the bar scene, which is just the best until it shades into the worst. Björk knows how to bypass the rational brain and go right for the subconscious mind that communicates in images and dream knowledge.



plus this one because it's such a great song.


(TIPS AND TRICKS: on a mac keyboard, you just have to click option U to get the umlaut and then type whatever letter needs it.)

mermaid migraine cure

Not much to post today because I've had a migraine most of the day. It's going away now because it finally started raining. Thank you, rain! (also: I took a lot of headache drugs.)

Anyway - maybe this mermaid is also post-migraine! Maybe she is smiling because her underwater headache finally dissipated! Maybe that's her mermaid bathrobe and she's just chilling on her mermaid couch which is made out of bubbles!

p.s. I attended a class on e-books today and the side effect is now I want an iPad mini.  It would be a nice companion to my old school keyboard kindle. Do I really need it? hell no. Do I want it anyway? YES I DO.

five things I saw today

1. flirty baby in bespoke dinosaur sweatshirt. I was shelving a book and the baby was being walked around by his fingers by Fedora Dad - the baby caught my eye and gave me a tiny smile and it was adorable.

2. first pages of Ms. Marvel by G. Willow Wilson. So far I LOVE IT.

3. Confusing forms. Part of my job is compiling notes every week from our morning meeting. The notes are written into a blank form that has been evolving over the last few weeks. One of the latest is printed front and back and the days were profoundly out of order (like Tuesday on the back of Friday). CHAOS. but it all worked out.

4. SO MANY COMCAST PAGES. I'm trying to figure out a better deal. Because we've had service for so long, the bill is mondo expensive and it's not even THAT GOOD. But guess what happens when you try to see offers for existing customers? The website somehow can't find that page. It's bullshit is what it is. I wish I could resolve it with internet searches and the power of my mind, but I think I'm going to have to call someone. UGH.

5. This is not even from this month but I'm going to write it down anyway.  Around the time of the release of How to Train Your Dragon 2, I witnessed a little girl go to the reference desk and ask with great dignity about reference books on dragons, like where they live and what they eat and where do they lay their eggs and how do you train one and what do they like to do and it also needs to have lots of pictures... I loved how she snuck the training in there like it was a total side note when it was obviously her main concern! We didn't have a book checked in at the time which directly addressed all of these issues, but the librarian found her something to begin her research.

beep beep, who got the keys to the jeep?

Like many spectacle-loving Americans, I watched the Super Bowl halftime show this morning on youtube. MISSY ELLIOTT!!!  I miss Missy! I didn't even know how much until I saw her again. I've collected a few videos so I have them all in one place when I want to watch them.

(other Katy Perry Spectacular note: I really loved that lion puppet she rode in on at the beginning - all that PLUS dancing sharks?? Come on! No complaints here.)



These videos are like a time machine to the late 90s/early 2000s. Wouldn't it be cool if they WERE a time machine? I'm not ruling it out.



Lots of MTV at the time familiar faces in all of these videos.




The Rain is the first time I remember seeing/hearing Missy Elliott. What a memorable song/video!  It seemed so different to everything else out there - so deliberately weird but compelling - like an alternate science fiction future in which we all look magnificent in our garbage bag garments and gold glitter head pieces.

I keep almost getting to what I want to say, but it's battling with the fact that I have to go to bed because I work in the morning so I can't quite get it right. Probably just as well. In a nutshell: she's an idiosyncratic national treasure and a hugely talented writer/performer/producer and I'm glad she's back.

brain ants, ant ants, ATLANTIS

I feel a major book purge coming on.

This is an exaggeration.

I feel A book purge coming on, which always seems major even when it's necessary and will improve my life. (I keep going to book sales and it's not like I'm coming home empty handed.)

ANYWAY. Do you ever get rid of books? How do you do it? Is there a system? There was a time in my life when I'd have said never would I ever, but I'm older and wiser now. Any collection needs maintaining or it will get stale and die - I've bought some things that seemed like if not a good idea at least a good deal, and some of those simply must go. It won't be bad once I get going, but I find myself reluctant to get going! I need the shelf space and there are some obvious candidates, and YET. Hmmm. A cushy conundrum, really.

Other things occupying my attention today:

• Busby the cat is feeling better enough that he does not care to eat his fancy prescription food and instead wants to eat (I mean REALLY wants to eat) Otis the striped cat's food. Again - not a problem with dire consequence, but still a problem.  
• Soda Crush Saga. 
• what will happen when I've seen every single British crime show? 
• I'm finally reading Wolf Hall! Have you read it? Did you like it? 
• my new calendar book that I made myself from a moleskine. I love it. More on this at a later date. 
• sewing: what next? I've got a long list of things I want to do, but I need to just jump in and do something - anything. (a familiar story.) 
• stupid black ants I hate you even though you're just doing what nature designed you to do. 
• blog stuff  - this joint looks very 2008. WHAT TO DO. It's not that I care so much what it looks like (although I do), it's that it's not very twenty-teens functional and we're in the middle of the twenty-teens! 
• pinterest, I love you

Okay. Enough from me for now. I will return. 

tree line

I'm in the beta group on flickr for the new uploader and camera roll, which means the computer found a bunch of pictures I never uploaded, like this one from the central valley of California in April of 2011. ANYWAY. Look out, is all I'm saying because there were a bunch of pictures I forgot all about (like this one) that are now in front of my face and some of them I'll be putting in front of yours.

I'm so relieved to be getting them off of the backup drive to my old kaput computer and into the cloud.  Those drives don't last forever and my computer certainly didn't - I'm so pleased to save the pictures!

things that are happening

HELLO NEW YEAR, WEEK THREE!

Before I get to anything else, I'm obliged to post this video because I LOVE IT.
I saw this on SNL back in November or whenever it was on, and it made me sit up and make a happy muppet face at the TV. It reminds me (and a lot of people) of Morris Day and the Time, but that only enhances my enjoyment!  It's so good and they're obviously having a good time being excellent at their jobs - something we can all aspire to in our way, even if we don't have a horn section.



And now on to the THINGS THAT ARE HAPPENING:


WORK:  I love it. Things get weird (mostly in my head) but then they level out. I’m trying some new things and so far I haven’t DIED FROM SHAME or whatever I was afraid of. I love working in the library. My coworkers are great PLUS I am literally in a building full of books every day that I work which is an optimal environment for me. Do I want to punch people in the throat occasionally? Of course! I’m only human. But I laugh or am excited by ideas more often than I want to punch anything, so thumbs up to that.

AT HOME: Busby the cat has diabetes! But he’s responding well to treatment so far which helps mitigate how wretched I felt for not noticing how wretched he was feeling. :( He's only been on insulin for a couple of days and had his first blood check at the vet this afternoon. The vet is pleased and the tech said "he is such a good guy" so obviously these people know what they're talking about.  More on this at a later date, I'm sure.

At the GYM: ha ha ha! Yeah, no. But I should get my sneakers on and go for more walks. I ate a lot of cookies over November/December as I am reminded every time I try to wear clothes that are not pajama pants. (Which is every day!)

WRITING: Oh, man. I haven’t been neglecting my blog because I’ve been so busy writing elsewhere - I’ve been largely on vacation from all of it. BUT...

READING: has been going great! We live in a golden age for reading and no one can convince me otherwise.

Here's the official video for Uptown Funk - I include it here because I can never listen to the song just once, even though it's showing up in every movie trailer on TV.