This pen(cil) really sucks

While I should be writing my novel (I'm a bit behind - need to write 2.5k just to be caught up to the daily goal by the end of today), I simply had to write a post about something different right this instant.

You might know me as a lover of office supplies. I love visiting office supply stores for as long as I can remember and seeing what they have that I want to try out. I needed to pick up a prescription and had $2 extrabucks at the CVS that were going to expire soon. I couldn't think of any usual toiletry/medicinal supplies or even any food, so I thought I'd allow myself to pick something up in the small office supply section.

I spotted the Sharpie Liquid Pencil. "Oooo," I breathed. Sharpie makes great stuff and this looked like a cool idea. So I grabbed it and headed over to the pharmacy. When I came home, I immediately opened the package and started writing with it. My heart sunk with every new stroke.

Simply put, it is an abysmal product. I'm not usually one for such drastically negative words and will try to find some redeeming features of just about anything. It looks like it came out well over a year ago and I'm surprised it's still on the shelves. I Googled around looking for other opionions and found that the majority of the reviews on Amazon are 1 stars. Some other reviews elsewhere are much more positive, even saying that it writes smoothly. Now, it's possible that I've gotten a faulty one, but I will include a photo of the results. I tried different pressures and angles with no success.

Glad I hung onto that receipt. Despite only actually spending a dollar on it, I'm never using it and can't even bring myself to be okay with spending a dollar ...

Writing and reading words (= life)

Today I managed just shy of 2.5k words. I hope to do the same tomorrow and Wednesday and from the view tonight it looks doable but we all know how well life gets in the way of life.

I just realized something that could potentially be disastrous to the story: I switched up something major by mistake. It's so ingrained into what I've written so far it would take a complete rewriting and a very different set of scenes to make it work the way I had planned. But - I won't edit what I've got and from what I can tell, it shouldn't cause any disasters I can't control. Other than that, I feel the story is going much better than the one last year. I did have a couple of scenes that I really liked last year but it remained stilted until it fizzled out sometime early in December.

I'm trusting the advice that the act of writing itself changes the story. Many novels are not completed because they ended up going somewhere the author hadn't intended, when (apparently) where they are going is much better than what was expected of them.

Colin and I started reading "A Walk in the Woods" by Bill Bryson in the car. It is one of the few books I've read frequently. I've never read it out loud before, but it is making it easy to see why I've never cared for any of his other books. I've pretty much attempted them all, although I have yet to try out "At Home" which I was given a copy of last Christmas. It is becoming clearer and clearer that if it's a book I read before and we read in the car, something about it just doesn't translate well when being read aloud. Most of Colin's books are great for reading out loud in the car though. *sigh*

Anyway, the main reason I bring the book up is because the whole "It wasn't what I expected" reminded me of it. Apparently, most people that start out hiking the AT and then quit soon, say it was because "It wasn't what I expected." You do have to wonder what they *did* expect. Was it not that hiking with everything on their back all day, day after day, mountain after mountain, would result in tiredness, fewer modern conveniences, and some smelliness?

I think I like going back to it again and again because it is not touchy-feely (many hiking memoirs are full of "searching for my self" and suchlike) but it is also not just pure data (the other half all just keep saying "And the next day I walked x miles from point a to point b. It was still raining."). Simply put, the book makes my feet itch for the trail.

A Novel on my Hands

Looks like the first big story idea I started with is turning out to be a novel. So I'm going to stick with it, see where it goes. I feel like I have a more definite plot idea and a good idea for what to end it on, as opposed to the story last year. Still, I'm not forcing myself to write just this one story so if it gets stuck or peters out, I'm moving on. Speaking of which, I've only managed just over 6k, not quite meeting the daily requirement. Now, it's possible I'll eke out some more words before sleep but today wiped me out.

The gang's all here, from my mom and dad, Grandpa, aunt and uncle, and us. And of course the people who live here - Laura, William, Becca and Daver. We spent quite a bit of time at the cafe downtown, slowly typing out some words for the novel. Then we met up with those flying in and had dinner at the Library (there's a restaurant/brewery with that name in the old public library building - very good). Then we saw Laura starring in the Fuddy Meers play, which I thought was fun and pretty good though I'm sure there's some bias on my part.

Now Colin and I are back in the hotel room, lazing around a bit watching real TV until falling into bed. The saddest parts are that there's no snow predicted for the rest of this weekend even though it's gonna be cold enough at night and that there's an NCIS marathon on Sunday - when we're going to be driving south again.

The rest of the Austin story

I've "restarted" the Nano story. I had started with the main character being in their early twenties but then realized everyone was strangers to me. So I backed up a bunch in the timeline and the fingers are flying. It's annoying though, how much I can't stop thinking about the story and writing more only increases this feverish feeling. I'm up to 4629 words and I have no poem for the day. I might think up one before bed but don't count on it.


I haven't yet finished describing the trip to Austin that happened last week. I had a great time - went to the LBJ Presidential Library and Museum on Monday. That night I didn't feel so great so I bought a box of cereal and some milk for dinner and rested in the hotel room. I took it easier on Tuesday but went to the State Library right next to the Capitol building and found a goldmine on Ashley's relatives in their stacks. Wednesday I finally got to visit the two small house museums next to the hotel - one was the house of Susanna Dickinson, messenger of the Alamo, and the other was a house O. Henry had lived in for a couple of years.

Colin's conference was finally over and we met up with Ashley and Philip, staying with them the rest of the week. However, after a late lunch of Vietnamese sandwiches on Thursday I fell miserably ill and spent the rest of the time laid up. It was probably food poisoning with a combination of really bad allergies and fatigue. I made it back home and I'm mostly over it by now but I'm still having trouble eating much and get tired a lot.

And tomorrow we hit the road again! This time it's northward, on to see my sister star in a play. I haven't seen my family since the wedding so it'll be nice to see them and see how William's adjusting to college life. As an added bonus, I get to see Becca! Again! For the fourth time this year! And we'll be spending sometime together working on our novels, of course.

Nano 2011, here we go

Today marks the first day of a new Nanowrimo season. I debated whether or not to do it this year, and then decided to shoot for it. Last year was a success, but mostly in the "I can write 50k words of the same story in a month" way and not much else. I looked back at what I would like to have done differently last year and the biggest one was: write things I would want to read and share afterwards. I didn't want to get rid of the carefree writing style, though - I just wanted to not be stuck with one story. I also had some ideas that were nonfiction. And, most importantly, I wanted to use the momentum to advance the stories without worrying about word counts. So 2011 is the Year of the Rebel. Rawr!

Additionally, I plan to pen (type) poems and post them here. The one for the day is not related to the story I'm working on in anyway except that I was writing the story while the event took place.

1

Neighborhood feral cat

white on black the night after Halloween

slinks out of the shadows

sits profile wise

and laps from the birdbath

a makeshift neon green shallow dish

then continues

to the other side

of the patio

back into the night.

In Austin, Texas

On Saturday we flew in at 3. When we left the house early in the morning, the first frost was still on the ground. We picked the last of the tomato crop and brought them inside, hoping that the greener ones will be ripe when we get back.

While Colin was working on his presentations, Ashley and Philip took me to the Light the Night event along with a couple of their Austin friends. The walk (more like a shuffle it was so slow) around the small lake with everyone holding blinking lights was pretty neat. There were tons of dogs there. Then we went to eat at a Tex-Mex place where we had margaritas and then good if slightly pricey food. It was very dark and loud.

Sunday morning I scoped out the book festival. I had plotted out an itinerary based on Saturday's events by mistake; I got there and realized that there was no presentations going on yet since the day started later on Sunday. I also found out that the author I'd hoped to see wasn't able to make it. Despite it all, I had a good time. 

I first went to “The Kitchen Counter Cooking School: How a Few Simple Lessons Transformed Nine Culinary Novices into Fearless Home Cooks” about a book with the same title by Kathleen Flinn. Not surprisingly, 95% of those in attendance were women. Flinn is humorous and made me think about a new angle on the concept of food that I hadn't noticed much before.

On the way back to the hotel for (free) lunch with Colin, I noticed some people milling around outside a theatre. It looked like there might be someone famous out front, with the mobs of cameras and the blocked-off area. Well, what do you know – I turned out to be 20 feet from James Franco. So of course I tried taking a few pictures myself, a couple which actually have his whole face in them instead of just an ear or forehead. I didn't push my way in or anything but I wanted to get proof of my first random celebrity spotting.

After lunch I went back for a few more events, two focusing on history. It was very hot out so I took the opportunity to step into a cafe and get an Italian soda to sip while I ran through the list of authors whose books were on sale at the festival. I also tried to listen to the author of “Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain” but it was in the House Chamber where it was very echo-ey. I could tell he (David Eagleman) was very entertaining but had no clue what he was talking about, so I left early on.

I didn't end up getting any books by any of the speakers I heard, but I did get a 2009 Festival shirt (it's prettier and only $10 instead of $25) and a couple other books - “Cleopatra” by Stacy Schiff and a signed copy of “How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe” by Charles Wu. It's been quite some time since I've bought books full price (okay, so they're paperback, but I'm traveling) but an undisclosed percentage of the sales is going toward the Festival which is free and open to the public. And I really needed a book to replace the one, “Liar's Club,” I started on the flights that I don't want to finish. It's supposed to be funny but it's downright depressing and a weird memoir based on events in which the writer relies on other people's memories and her own vague ones of her childhood. Yeah, I'm gonna go read “Cleopatra” instead.

Punkins and Prohibition

The two topics I wanted to blog about aren't related except that they've come into my consciousness the past 24 hours. They interest me, but I know that what I find fascinating would bore others to tears - I hope that this is short and humorous enough to entertain instead.

First, punkins:

I was just wondering about the differences in pronunciation of the word "pumpkin." My grandpa always pronounces it as "punkin." When I tried to search for what might be the reason for the wildly different ways of saying it, I was only able to find a dictionary entry stating that the pronunciation was: 

[puhmp-kin or, commonly, puhng-kin]

Then I found a hubpage made about pumpkins. No mention of how to pronounce it, but the article is educational. My favorite part was the history of how the pumpkin pie came about:

 instead of cutting them into strips and baking them, the colonists cut off the top, scooped out the seeds, and then filled the hollow pumpkin with milk, honey and spices. Once filled, they replaced the top and baked the pumpkin in the hot coals of a fire thereby inventing pumpkin pie

I still am not quite sure what regional differences, etc. there are - I'm open to ideas.

Prohibition:

One of the stranger aspects of volunteering at a church library that has been out of commission for years is finding, for lack of a better word, archaic texts. "Bombs of Infinite Power" which has been "stockpiled" by Allen R. Blegen is merely a long list of short and popular Bible passages. While this can be explained by the publication date, which is 1964, there is no reason to have it in any current library, only in archives. 

Another old pamphlet-sized monograph is titled "To Drink or Not to Drink? A Vital, Personal Problem Facing America To-Day" by James W. Johnson. There is no publication date listed, but it's clear it was after the Great War (World War I) and before World War II, during the Prohibition Era (1920-33). I had expected to see a religious argument but there was very little Biblical reference.

Instead, it started out with a numerated list of reasons drinking should be legal. Not too bad, I give the writer points for attempting to give voice to both sides. However, there are the four pages of both introduction and anti-Prohibition arguments contrasting the 16 pages of why Prohibition is necessary.

The four main points:

1. Liberty
1. PRO Obviously, thinking men and women should be able to have the choice and if they're not thinking, they're only hurting themselves, not others.
2. CON But they're not hurting just themselves; we have a duty to be our brother's keeper. The Law should uphold the moral law. States have to give up some of their liberty to become part of the United States. "The appeal for personal liberty is powerful. The appeal for brotherhood is overwhelming."
2. Old Customs
1. PRO We have indulged in alcoholic beverages for ages. "The abuse of wine was always condemned, not wine used in moderation."
2. CON Just because we've always done it doesn't mean we should continue to do it. Think about polygamy ("Even when practiced under the camouflage of religion the Mormons ...") and slavery.
3. Physical Needs
1. PRO Alcohol can be stimulating and cheering when used in moderation. It is even recommended by doctors in certain cases of physical illness.
2. CON Even for the cases which alcohol can help, there are alternatives which work just as well, if not better. There are far too many negative outcomes ("The alcoholic ward, the crime committed in drunken frenzy, the suicidal act ...") to deny that it is usually tragic for the many.
4. The Social Instinct
1. PRO "In all social gatherings from time immemorial, at feasts, banquets and celebrations, the use of wine has been the custom." And being good social animals is important.
2. CON The saloon is the poor man's club, but "it must be admitted that poverty is increased by drinking." Along with the patriotic duty that calls for every man to be his fittest.

And it goes on to describe other pro-Prohibitionist points, most of which are no big surprise, including the argument that man must be protected from his temptations but that the expressed desire of the majority for the Prohibition will win out in the end. "There may be a return to (previous) conditions ... but such a setback will only be temporary. Because, as Lincoln so tersely said, 'You can't fool all the people all the time.'"

The passage I find most amusing is the one about the "very real difference between the temperament of Americans and the temperament of foreigners." How Americans are intense, high-strung, and keen, which is responsible for excess in many ways. "We cannot even enter into our sports without often suffering more from exhaustion and overplay than we benefit from the relaxation and the exercise. This is especially true of our young men and women. It is not equally true of most foreigners."

Can't you just hear the grumpy old man's voice in your head from 80 to 90 years ago?

Camping, stick bugs, and brown snakes

Yesterday afternoon we left to go camping for one night, the third visit to Kettle Moraine SP - South. It's only an hour (usually an hour and a half because of traffic) away from our house, in the woodsier, lumpier, and rockier areas of Wisconsin.

We were gone for less than 24 hours but it was rejuvenating. We had a walk-in site which was mostly uphill from the car than "in." I forgot the can opener but was able to use my pocket knife. We had way too much food but that is not an especially big problem. We are discovering that the little pot the stove (Mini Trangia) came with might not be quite big enough; we used the normal, larger pot I packed for both meals. Then again, we ended up with more food than we could eat and making meals is a bit different when backpacking (I wouldn't take a whole can of mixed veggies, for instance, but some dehydrated stuff instead).

I've also been experimenting with how to keep the sleeping pads from drifting apart in the night and creating a cold gap. There is a strappy device that I spotted online but couldn't find it being sold and some people complained it didn't work anyway. Then I found a suggestion to use some of that sticky shelf liner stuff under the pads. We tried a couple of squares of that the last trip. There was less drifting but nowhere near enough anchorage and the liner actually rolled up in the night.

So this time I got more (it's $1.50 for 5 feet - and Menard's has a $1.50 mail-in rebate), enough to be able to wrap in width-wise. I didn't want to glue it, so I sewed up one end of the two pieces and then used twist ties to bind the opposite ends while setting up camp. The metal twist ties poked through, so that needs to be changed. I also think wrapping it in the center instead of near the top might help things. But all in all, after I readjusted once when we were settled in, there was only a negligible amount of drifting.

The moon was full and bright last night. We kept nice and warm, but some critter (probably a raccoon) got his paws on an open package of graham crackers (the threat of wildlife getting into food is very low there and we thought things were well tucked away). We also spotted a stick insect missing a leg:

And a (very harmless) brown snake in its red stage:

And now we're back home, with drippy noses. Don't feel particularly sick but there's a vague feeling that we're both fighting something. This means it's simple noodles and canned sauce for dinner since I'm not up to making anything more adventurous.

And talk of shoes and ships and sealing wax ...

computer

Something I've recently taken up (again) is running. Or, rather, jogging. I started out when the temperatures were finally dropping down to a reasonable range in late August. One thing that prompted me to do it was "Born to Run." I enjoyed the story and was intrigued by the idea of "natural running."

I've been feeling some physical improvements - strong and more endurance. I've also been constantly quelling shin splints, which aren't debilitating since I run in short sections between walking. The key word is slow. Still, I've been able to run more frequently and longer. If you don't care to read the details about shoes, you might want to skip the next three paragraphs (they contain blisters).

As for the natural running method, I looked at barefoot shoes. The Vibram Five Fingers wouldn't work for me, simply because of my weird toes; the second-to-smallest curls under the middle one and trying to straighten it out is uncomfortable. So, I spotted some similar shoes by Merrell. I really like Merrell; their shoes really do last a looong time. I have a pair of shoes I bought for study abroad (where I walked a LOT - some of it with cheap flip flops that my roommate in Rome was shocked I still wore after we came back) and they're still my main pair of shoes.

I got really excited about the Merrell Pure Glove (Mary Jane style), especially when I found out they were 30% off at REI where I have a gift certificate. I looked at the store but they only had one pair that were too large. So I ordered a half size down online. Still seemed too big. Ordered the next size down and those seemed just right. Then I made the classic rookie mistake of taking them with me to SF - and getting a huge blister on my heel less than a mile into walking. This really surprised me - all the reviews raved about how they fit so well. So I guessed they were still too big. Except instead of length-wise, it looks like they were too wide (I have quite narrow feet). I could have ordered yet another pair to try but I wasn't optimistic about the idea; instead, I just boxed them up and sent them back. Eventually I will get a pair of Merrell Pace to try, which look a lot more like normal tennis shoes and are definitely fit more snugly all around when I tested them in the store.

Meanwhile, both pairs of old running shoes I tried didn't work (gave me blisters). Luckily, I have a pair of shoes I bought in India that don't have much cushioning and I've been using those. I can't quite remember what brand they are and I'm out and about right now. *end shoe stories*

Colin and I have both been having computer scares lately. Thank goodness we have a backup system. We're near an Apple store where Colin took his computer last night after it become completely unresponsive and found that they had to replace the motherboard. Which they did for free and we were able to pick it up this morning.

My own machine has been acting crankier than usual (on top of having very shot battery life). It would probably be a good idea just to get the next machine before this one completely up and dies. *sigh* Then again, over three years for an early version of a netbook is not bad. I've been looking both at newer netbooks and at computers that come with Linux. Sadly, they're almost mutually exclusive categories, although some of the Linux computers are on the smaller side, with an exception of Asus X101 that has a great price to boot. The solid state hard drive and the no ethernet port makes me pause, so I'm keeping an eye out for more reviews.

Okay, we're going to head home now. It's yet another glorious day outside!

San Francisco, Second Time Around

It's been over a month since I last posted and I hardly realized it. On the other hand, I don't believe that the wedding was less than two months ago. Not because I don't like being married but it was so very nice to have all that over with.

We just got home from San Francisco last night. It amuses me to think of Colin needing training on how to talk to people but then again it was mandatory for everyone who is presenting at the conference next month. Annoying that they (still) can't let him know in a more reasonable amount of time in advance but this time Colin was much more determined that I come along after having been so sick the last time he went.

What did I do? Well, I rode a lot of public transportation, for one, which I didn't mind. Sitting, watching the landscape go by, doing crossword puzzles, and reading is much preferred over driving in a strange place. On Monday I went and visited Kelsay. Since she was north of SF and I was in Redwood City, it took almost two hours one way to get there. We had a great time catching up. She took me to a couple of cool eats in her area (a shotglass of gazpacho, anyone?) and then we went back to her apartment for a bit. It was nice to see her cat Kiki again who she'd gotten while in Kzoo.

Colin and I went to a Thai restaurant near the hotel that was amazingly good. The awkward teenage boy who served us reminded me of my brother. My food came out on top of a dish with charcoal bits in it still burning so it continued boiling for quite some time. Colin had the leftovers for the next two lunches and never got tired of it.

Tuesday I went to the Winchester Mystery House near San Jose. It took even longer to get there because I mistakenly assumed that the light rail ended at the house but instead it ended at the neighborhood named Winchester. No problem, just had to catch a bus. While waiting, I went across the street to a Safeway and grabbed up some quick lunch bites. By the time the tour was done, I had very little spare time and decided just to start heading back to Redwood City. So didn't see as much as I had anticipated seeing but I enjoyed the day and that was (and always is) the point. I did, however, stress out slightly (mostly with the fact that I was running later than I'd planned and my phone was dead) when I tried to take a different walking route back to the hotel and found myself going on a fairly large detour through a Latino neighborhood. Thankfully, Colin didn't worry; he got to the room a couple minutes after I did. That night we went to a American/German restaurant where I had grilled chicken and mashed potatoes. We took a slice of a chocolate pie back to the hotel for dessert.

Wednesday I decided to go back to San Jose but this time straight to downtown. Colin didn't need to pick up one of his coworkers so we had a nice breakfast at Cafe La Tartine before I dropped him off and parked at the next train stop south (saving 4 bucks on the ticket - and I didn't have to pay for parking). I had anticipated using the "daily" pass which I'd gotten Tuesday and didn't expire until 3 PM but when I went to board the bus to downtown, I saw that there was a free shuttle going to exactly where I wanted to go: the San Jose Library.

Yes, I am totally a library geek. And yes, I pretty much spent all day there. It's an awesome library - 8 floors, gazillions of desks with power outlets at each one, sunlight throughout the whole building, and gorgeous views of the city and the mountains beyond ... It is a unique library, too; it serves as both the San Jose University's and the public's library and I've gotta say it pulls it off very well.

I found a letterbox which sadly didn't contain its stamp but I stamped in anyway. I looked around in the room dedicated to Salinger (I really like his little portable typewriter) and then in the one for Beethoven. I was actually given an impromptu tour by one of the librarians in the Beethoven library (including the display with a lock of the composer's hair) and then told that someone would be giving a performance that afternoon on the various piano predecessors. I immediately scrapped all other plans and ran out for a quick lunch of sushi (which was delicious even if they were so big I could barely chew them).

After that, I walked over to where the Peralta Adobe and the Fallon House were then continued on to the train station. It was not a terribly long walk but it was hot (90 degrees), sunny, and dry, so I stopped to get a frozen drink that was possibly the best coconut drink I have ever had. Upon reaching the station, I realized I'd missed all the trains I thought I might be able to catch (it was too hot to walk any faster) and the next was in half an hour. Sitting still in the air conditioned room was blissful. I arrived early near where Colin was, and found a public access area on the water. There was a very steady wind from the northeast which made me chilly (big change from San Jose!). I sat and read until Colin was ready to go. Dinner was at a Mexican restaurant where we shared a tortilla dish.

Thursday (yesterday) our flight was boarding at noon and we were both worn out so we just took it easy getting going. We sat in a Peet's for a little bit before heading to the car rental place. On our flight, we played with the Chromebooks that were being lent out. I was mostly neutral about it; while it's true the vast majority of my computer time is online, I don't want everything through the browser. The price is a bit higher than I care for, too. I had to love the long battery life, of course. Things were running slowly and the free onboard wifi cut out a couple times. I spent time looking around at options for my next computer (my current one gave me a scare recently) and then switched to reading an analog book.

After the four hour flight and no lunch, we were ravenous and had Applebee's before heading home. Slept well last night, despite suddenly waking myself up, with Colin sitting and reading next to me. He gave me the strangest look and asked what I'd been dreaming about. I couldn't remember and he said that I'd been talking a lot of gibberish (which I sometimes do especially when really tired). "Oh. Okay," and then I crashed back to sleep.

I think I'll post pictures and a couple other stories later ... this is quite long enough as it is. Oh, and perhaps I'll talk about what else is going on these days, sooner rather than later (oy).

Why have you invaded my thoughts, autumn?

Lately I've been daydreaming about autumn. It seems I'm nostalgic for leaves turning colors, hot apple cider, and snuggling in poofy sweaters while there's a crisp sunny breeze in the air. Being able to sit next to a fireplace in a cafe and be thankful for the warmth against the chilly breezes periodically invited in through the door. I can't help it - I keep trying to remind myself how much I yearn for these warmer sunny days of summer when it's wintertime, how fleeting autumn really is, and how it will be here soon enough. I think just one day of real cool weather would help fix things and then I can go back to loving summer. But really, we've used up all the heat quota for the year, don't you think?

Aside from that, I got some 100% cranberry/grape juice and seltzer water today. Not as sweet as Italian sodas from cafes, but still pretty good. Tasty while still being healthy! I was able to catch Colin on video chat for a few minutes yesterday and today but it wasn't quite enough. While I'm enjoying having two-thirds of the couch entirely to myself all the time, I really look forward to my new hubby coming home on Saturday.

What else? The dean at the library wasn't able to meet with me until next week so no news on that front. My dad is competing in the national canoe race this weekend, both the 2-man and 1-man events. His goal: Don't finish last. I found a beetle on the cucumber plant, two peppers have flowers, and a couple of potato plants have popped up under the eaves outside of the little ditch where I planted all the eyes (they probably moved when the patch was flooded). Along with the robins and sparrows that use the makeshift bird bath, we've now got a hummingbird feeder which has been attracting a few of those little guys. They sometimes try to suck the food out of the crack between the glass and the plastic bottom when there's perfectly functioning fake flowers with ledges they can sit on. Not terribly bright but fun to watch.

I feel like I've done enough productive things for the day but for some reason I can't bring myself to just sit and read a book. Sadly, it's something I rarely do outside of just before going to sleep or specific situations. I've read a bit more this week than usual, with no Colin around to interrupt me. I'm also keen on getting back into the genealogy research but feel at a loss just where to jump back in and how to restrain myself from letting it suck up all my time. I think part of it is the fact that the time researching in Massachusetts was such a short and intense period.

Let every moment be a teaching lesson

Colin left this morning for an overseas business trip. He won't be back until Saturday. It will be interesting to see how this goes, especially since it's been a while since we actually spent more than an hour or two apart. Meanwhile, married life continues to be pretty much the same, if on less sleep than usual which I'm not sure is cause/effect. The house is still much more cluttered than I'd like but it's a process. My sister was in town this weekend and that was fun, despite the stress of a bolt haven sheared off on one of her tires coming here. When she and Colin inspected it, it turned out the tire had been held on by one nut. So we took it in and got that all fixed up before she headed to the airport to pick up her boyfriend who's coming back from study abroad. Phew!

We've also been watching a lot of Doctor Who which is on Netflix and most episodes have captions. The second season's first episode (2006) did not, however, but Colin was patient enough to explain what was being said without overwhelming my non-multitasking brain.

I don't know much more about my job. The dean was out on vacation on Friday when I went to work and the secretary was also not there. I plan to call and schedule an appointment. Meanwhile, since it's not yet the fall semester and I haven't been denied any access, I'm still doing the regular online chat reference hours.

For the most part, I enjoy doing this. Almost everyone expects that they will be getting a librarian at their own library when they ask a question and I certainly don't blame them. I have yet to see a library webpage that explains that the "chat with a librarian" means it could be *any* librarian. Most people either take it in stride or get confused but then realize that it makes sense (after explanations). Some have very specific questions to the school and sign off abruptly when they realize I'm not physically at the school before I can find them a phone number or suggest that I can forward their question on to a local librarian. Then there's a vast number of "Where's the stapler?" questions - ones that I easily find the answer to by just looking around on their libraries' websites.

The easiest ones are those that are truly glad to get whatever you can give them, that are patient, and are willing (even eager) to explain further what it is they're looking for. It doesn't matter what the question is or how hard it is to find the answer; I enjoy working with these patrons. One person had a question that was more appropriate to start researching through Google and they were in awe of the idea of using "site:edu" to narrow search results to only academic webpages.

The hardest ones are those who are impatient and have unreasonable expectations. Or make assumptions. Recently I had an especially difficult one who assumed their school was "now farming out the reference questions to Illinois" and corrected my slangy spelling of "alright," warning me that I didn't want anyone to think those in Illinois were hicks. It felt like they were here to correct some random librarian's "mistakes" and trying to bait me with a topic not related to their question. For me to remain professional, it helps if who I am interacting with does the same. (Don't worry, I didn't bite.)

While I was initially tempted to just rant about this, I decided that a better thing to do was to use it as a way to show what works and what doesn't work when you're asking a librarian questions online. I read many librarian blogs and what I've said seems completely in the realm of what is appropriate to blog about, especially if it is to reveal how a service or approach is or is not working.

Mmm lunchtime! Then perhaps a nap ...

From the keyboard of a married woman

Lots of things have happened lately but I don't want this to turn into a long-winded post (mostly because I want to post before we leave for dinner with friends tonight).

Wedding: Pulled it off and it went terrific! There were glitches but we took them in stride. The weather was perfect. I do wish we had had more hours in the afternoon to really get into the letterboxing but that's the way it goes. I have absolutely no pictures yet; I didn't even take any photos with my own camera during any of the events, including the relaxing camping trip we did with some other people Saturday through Monday. So now it's back to "real life" - with new stuff to sort through, dirty clothes to wash, and rings on our fingers. But really, as expected, we were already practically married so actually having a wedding didn't change a whole lot. There is a sense of "things are easier" - not having to struggle with the inadequate names for each other, like "boyfriend." One word of advice I have for those planning weddings: Get a room with a hot tub. I'm not being dirty here; lying in the hot water is the *perfect* way to relax after the stress of The Big Day.

Job: It appears I don't actually have a job this fall semester. It's very vague and confusing. I plan to find out more when I'm in on Friday. More details as I learn them.

Hearing aids: Earlier last week I finally got my new hearing aids! I had had the same Phonak Powerzoom analog hearing aids for TEN YEARS. It is nothing short of a miracle that they lasted that long. They're still fine, but I wanted to be proactive and get new hearing aids *before* I couldn't hear with my old ones anymore.

I'm still adjusting to these new Phonak Naida S V UP digital ones (they're ALL digital now, or at least the ones that will work for me). Some things are much easier: they're water resistant (no need to dry my hair before putting them in), they don't have interference with my cellphone, and listening to people with any amount of background noise is soooo much easier. Being in the car is distracting; the hearing aids go back and forth between dimming the noises and picking up Colin's voice. I don't like it at all, it doesn't seem safe for when I'm driving, but I've found when I put the hearing aids in the one other mode that's on them (so far) it's much more consistent - this is kind of funny because the mode is meant for blocking out background noise but I find that the normal mode is much nicer in crowds. Also, I still struggle with how different things/voices sound and how loud or soft my own voice should be in situations. Ooo, and the new ones are this dark transparent blue!

Webcomics: While not technically a life update, I've discovered two webcomics lately that I've been going through. One is "Scandinavia and the World" and the other is "Girls with Slingshots." The webcomic above is from "Girls with Slingshots;" I'm finding a lot of the story lines seem to resonate with me right now. As for the other one, I'm only sad that I didn't discover it earlier because it is helping to satisfy my craving for connecting with my strange and mysterious Scandinavian heritage.

Google Plus: One more thing! I'm enjoying this new feature and I have high hopes for it. I would love to cancel my facebook account but for social reasons I can't (at least not yet - can everybody switch to Google Plus? please?). I haven't posted much yet on Google Plus, but I check it regularly. My main battle is when I try to decide whether to post something on Plus or Twitter. I'm holding onto both at least for now. As for a blogging alternative, I'm not sure I'll ever get rid of this blog at least in the foreseeable future, but I'm intrigued by the idea of using Google Plus for shorter, more frequent posts without being limited to 140 characters.

Also - three red tomatoes in our garden!

Robins, black raspberries, and a very big storm

What do you do when you're tired and just want to lie on the couch but you want to feel productive beyond shifting through inane internet babble? Apparently I decide it's a good time to write a post.

I love watching robins take baths (or avoid them as the teenaged ones do) and various birds drink from the makeshift basin (tupperware container) we have on the patio. It was a happy accident that I had left it out there with water in it once and noticed the birds appreciated it.

Oh, and the garden is still mostly green. There is the tiniest sweet pepper and cucumber, neither of which  I don't think will actually grow up, but the tomatoes are doing pretty well. And potato plants seem to be thriving. I finally moved the lavender from the little container it originally came in into a little pot for each plant but they had started to whither really fast; they were doing quite well earlier.

There was a huge storm Monday morning. Colin woke me up, pointing out the window. I sat up, saw that there was sheets of rain pouring down the window, and fell back into bed hoping for more sleep. "Oh, that's nice," was about all I could muster. The power in our house apparently went out for less than an hour that morning.

We had considered going south to Deerfield that day but decided against it. We went about doing our usual home-bound activities. By mid-afternoon, we'd decided to go run a couple errands and hang out in a coffee shop in an area usually about 20-30 minutes from our house. While driving through our town, we were intrigued by the lack of lights - no stoplights were working and all the businesses looked black and shuttered up. Of course, that didn't ward us off at all. In retrospect it would have been a good time to turn around; we ended up sitting in traffic for three hours. And only being able to get one little thing at a hardware store and grabbing some coffee to go. The cafe was jam packed with people on laptops and everything else except the hospital seemed to be shut down. We went so far we saw the lake.

Tuesday was really not much better; I went to get some milk and other food stuffs at grocery store in the opposite direction that we took the day before. First, I had to pay for gas with cash. Then the store was closed. So I went to another store, which was open but had no milk. Had nothing that usually is kept cold or frozen, in fact.

There are trees and branches down everywhere. I left half an hour earlier than usual for my shift at work this morning anticipating bad traffic but it was actually just fine. However, I learned that some coworkers still don't have power at home, including one who doesn't have running water either. There's apparently something like 100,000 people who probably won't get power back until Saturday.

What was the storm damage to my garden? One unripe tomato ripped off by the wind. We were just plain lucky.

...

I went for a walk near the college today and stumbled across some black raspberries. There was quite a lot of them and it didn't look like anyone or anything had eaten them. They were yummy.

The wedding is in two weeks and one day. We've gotten so much done but it feels like there's still so much to do, despite how low key, small, and simple we're keeping it. I don't want to imagine the headache organizing a more normal wedding would be - ick.

I'm feeling a little more awake now so I'm going to go get more things checked off the wedding to do list.

So I caved in

Earlier, I had mentioned that I was trying to resist maintaining multiple blogs on different topics. This rule has been broken. But - I like to think I have a good reason: I didn't want everyone everywhere to be able to read the new blog.

Don't worry, it's nothing embarrassing; it's just as a SLIS grad I was faced with a privacy dilemma. Last weekend we were in Charlevoix. We came home with a bunch of boxes from my grandparents' house and I wanted some way to share the scans and what I learned with other family members. Having a blog also provides incentive beyond "Ooo this is fun!"

It's not completely restricted to family members only, but since you need to ask me for access I have absolute control over who can see the stuff. So if you're interested in following or seeing what it's like, go ahead and ask for permission and (if I know you as a real person) I would probably let you in. Also, even if I wasn't worried about privacy, I would be worried about having a massive amount of posts that were possibly long and possibly boring (to most people) put up where, frankly, most people could care less about that and be more interested in, well, me and ... whatever else I do? The garden, yes that's it!

Speaking of the garden:
The zucchini plant has lots of buds which is very exciting. The lower leaves on all my pepper plants seem to be breaking off but otherwise they look healthy and half of them have had flowers (one each). The herbs are doing fine despite their lack of space.

Two little potato plants

My potato experiment is promising too; there are 11 separate plants that have sprung up with little bundles of leaves. I resist watering them, especially since they were flooded with the rain a few days ago. They seem happiest having no attention so far.

Today has been a nice relaxed Saturday. We went out for brunch, talked over wedding plans and what else we have to do. On the way home, we stopped for garage sales but didn't get anything (despite our garage sale-ing experience around here, we still hope). Then we went to a nice lake/pond park we hadn't been to and caught bullfrogs. And one teeny tiny toad. There was a family of three kids there who we helped out with how to catch them (and not kill or hurt them). There were a couple caught that still had fairly large tails. It was a lot of fun but it's quite humid today and eventually we left.

A bullfrog

 When we got home, we checked in on the nest in the tree out front where there's currently a dove family. The adult has been slowly getting pushed up out of the nest as the babies grew but it wasn't until today that we could actually see both of the babies. We knew there might be two because Colin had taken a picture earlier of the two eggs and finally we were able to see the face of the second one without having to hold the camera above our heads and take a picture.

The second one shown - the other is hidden by the branch.

Photo proof of what I did last Sunday

I know I mentioned that I cut my hair and all, but I didn't post any pictures yet. Here's a couple:

The before - so. much. hair ...

From behind - the lumpy bits is evidence of having it up in a ponytail or bun
(which was most of the time)

The aftermath - if I pulled it straight it comes to 10.5"

 I don't have any "after" photos of what my head looks like just yet. I know some were taken at the open house but I don't have them myself. Perhaps I'll leave you suspense! At least, until I can get someone (Colin) to take another picture. One thing I would be interested to know before I send the package off to Locks of Love is just how heavy all that hair is ... I just measured the circumference - just over 3.75 inches:

Maybe not the thickest in the world but according to this page (http://www.longhaircareforum.com/showthread.php?t=294247) I've got well more than average. *sigh*

Another thing: It's so much faster to dry it. Colin was quite surprised this morning that I was all done in a lot less time. Plus, no more time spent untangling!

Heat, gardening, wedding planning, and smaller topics

In the words of Neil Gaiman: "Sorry that I've been away. I am a bad blogger." And indeed, it's been two months minus ten days since I've last written.

First, before jumping into what's going on in my life, I love reading the dialogs found here: http://jen-campbell.blogspot.com/search/label/weird%20things%20customers%20say

Summer has unabashedly arrived; the last couple of days has been very hot with the temperature dropping to high 70s at night. I saw 104 degrees on the car dashboard yesterday but that was after it had been sitting in full sunlight in a parking lot a couple hours. The real temperature seemed to hover at 98 and 99 degrees. It's a mere 90 degrees now at noon today.

I've got myself a container garden that was a gift from Colin's mom.
The list:
One zucchini
One cucumber
6 tomatoes
6 bell peppers (3 yellow, 3 red)
An assortment of herbs

There isn't anywhere near enough dirt in the pots so that's my gardening goal of the day. Silly me, I watered the plants this morning so I have to wait a bit. At least I've got all the material. Despite the heat, I've spent the last couple days burying old potato pieces with eyes on them in the clay-ey ground under the eaves (in the late afternoon when watering the garden a second time in the shade). I'm probably drowning the potatoes when I water them but I'm trying to keep them cool. The potatoes are not a high investment project and I needed to dig up the dirt anyway so I could include it in the pots. I'll undoubtedly post updates on the garden. It might even be what prompts future blog posts to happen.

The main reason I've been neglecting the blog is that the big thing happening in my life right now is wedding planning and I wanted to try to tell as many people one-on-one that Colin and I are getting married before I mentioned it here. Which makes it a bit difficult to do any blogging. For those who didn't know yet, I apologize - it's so difficult to get to everyone especially when almost everyone lives so far away.

Let me say right away: This is not a big formal white wedding.

- It is small; just immediate family and close friends. People that have actively been a part of our lives the past 3.5 years we have been a couple. Less than 50.

- It is laid back and casual. I'm only wearing dresses so we can do the whole "bride as the centerpiece" thing. However, I've got plans for the actual ceremony which don't include a white dress.

The wedding is less than two months away. The invitations were going to go out in the mail this week but they won't be done until next Monday. There's still things to be sorted out, but I don't expect the actual planning and preparing to take over as much of my days as it has in the last few days until the time is much closer. (We'll see. This sentence might come back to  taunt me.)

Logistics aside, it's hard for me to put a positive spin on the experience right now. At the same time, I don't want to get into a rant and moan about all the details. I'm kind of confused about this, since it's pretty much a "yay they didn't elope" party, there's so many wedding-y things we're not doing and so many potential fires that aren't happening.  Hopefully things will look better after we spend this weekend with my family; we haven't been to my parents' house since Thanksgiving and my brother's high school graduation open house is on Saturday.

I made zucchini bread a couple days ago that's probably poisonous. So my heart drops with the sight of dropping the whole thing in the trash. I try to keep telling myself "It's better than getting sick from it and next time I won't use the 8x8 pan but have two 8x4 pans like the recipe said to use."

Despite the weather and the stress, I find myself having quite a few happy moments. I wonder if it's my body's way of preventing things from overwhelming my life. Plus, I like the rhythm the garden's needs puts in my day, even the aches and blisters it gives me. Ooo and also I have been reading the Hunger Games trilogy. While not sunshine and daisies, the books are sooo gooood.

I also gave myself a haircut on Sunday. I was so tired of how long it was. It hadn't been that long since sometime in elementary school; it was starting to get caught under my arms and when I had it pulled back (which was most of the time) I would catch my head being tilted too far back because of the weight. I guess the final straw was when I was trying to remake a bun and I broke the pencil when I didn't even think I was pushing it that hard. My hair broke a pencil just by looking at it.

So I lopped off more than enough for what I think is my third Locks of Love donation. I can still pull what's left into a small pony tail and I need to trim it since one side is longer than the other but otherwise I like the layered and slanted bob look. The very instant after I had fully cut through the thick rope (the scene in Princess Bride when Vizzini is cutting the rope at the Cliffs of Insanity doesn't do cutting my hair justice) was the most shocking and relieving. My hair was still in shock for a day or so but I had been looking forward to cutting it for so long I adjusted much quicker.

Okay, it's time to get back to what needs to be done before we leave tonight for Michigan.

Stupid weather gods didn't heed my memo/tweet

When I got up this morning, I opened the blinds and I was greeted with this sight:

I went downstairs, walked up to Colin who was sitting on the couch, and said, "It's snowing!"
"No it's not!" he retorted.
I walked over to the back door and opened the blinds.
"WHAT?" said Colin. "I thought you were sh*tting me!"

Nope.

So it has since then stopped snowing and started dripping off the trees. It is hovering at 34 degrees and the stuff isn't sticking to the pavement, but it's much more snow-like than the stuff that came down on Saturday, melted on impact, and caused me to tweet "It's snowing. Methinks that someone didn't get the memo upstairs. #argh"

Let me repeat myself: I thought it was April ...

Persistent or annoying? How about both?

In the last 11 days, I've gotten 11 phone calls from K College. Not exactly one per day but that's what it averages out to.

My magic google voice assistant prevents the phone from ringing when they call and then it will tell me I missed a call from them. No voicemail messages are ever left.

I have a lot of thoughts on this. Most of it goes something like this: OK I know you want my money. If it was something else (important) you would leave a message. I have a job but it pays very little. Just leave me alone. Pestering me won't make you turn favorable in my eyes and only reminds me of the burns from K College bureaucracy. I admire persistence and I feel for the student callers doing the legwork, but ...

Why aren't they calling Colin too? What makes a new part time reference librarian more likely to be a potential donation source than a software engineer who has held a job more than the average '07 alum?

I think there should be a ten year embargo on recent graduates. Then the memories have time to take a nostalgic sheen, money and stability have more time to occur, etc. It's not like we're going to just forget a place that sucked us dry for four years. Even though I in no way regret going to K College.

Does this make sense to anyone else? Or am I just bitter and cranky?

A few random internet links

http://blog.libraryjournal.com/annoyedlibrarian/2011/04/14/a-success-of-national-library-week/
I personally believe that having an annual Library Week is not a bad thing, but I really enjoyed reading the history of its origins, especially in the annoyedlibrarian's tone.

http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/object.cfm?key=35&objkey=2
Anything to get Helen Keller out of the "poor little deaf and blind girl" image gets an A in my book. Also, it's just one of those things I would have never wondered about on my own - other than someone signing the time to her, how would she know? Or better yet, how did she perceive what time was, without auditory or visual clues?

http://reason.com/archives/2011/04/04/sorry-charley
*gasp* Why, that lying ...
Wait, how come this doesn't surprise me? A writer taking out more than a little creative license. Wow. "It’s not like Steinbeck wrote a phony Holocaust memoir that sullies the memories and souls of millions of victims." A great snippet below (try clicking on the "print" button if you find the flashing ads as distracting as I do).

"Maybe Travels With Charley should be shelved with Steinbeck’s novels instead of in the nonfiction section. All nonfiction is part fiction, and vice versa. It’s not like Steinbeck wrote a phony Holocaust memoir that sullies the memories and souls of millions of victims.


"From what I can gather, Steinbeck didn’t fictionalize in the guise of nonfiction because he wanted to mislead readers or grind some political point. He was desperate. He had a book to make up about a failed road trip, and he had taken virtually no notes. ... Then his publisher, The Viking Press, marketed the book as nonfiction, and the gullible reviewers of the day—from The New York Times to The Atlantic—bought every word."

http://whenparentstext.com/post/4161354029
DAD: I am filling out your income tax 1040. Are you still single? Kids?

Ever read whenparentstext.com? I've been trying to pick a particularly funny one to put here. My dad did something very similar on last year's tax forms he mailed me so I thought I'd share that one. I like the site - perhaps a bit too much, since I can't stop giggling which means Colin has to work in the other room.

I apologize if you didn't care for the randomness of this post ... I wanted to blog something and this is what happened. How is everyone else on this rainy Friday? 

A bun!

My hands have been covered in pen marks all day, from various attempts to get my hair into a bun - without bobby pins or elastic bands. And ta da! It is currently securely held together with two pens! This, I can assure you, is indeed an accomplishment. I've been making more buns lately as my hair gets longer and even the ponytail is getting to feel a bit in the way. I've done this with the old "twist up, wrap, and secure with band." This is always a hit-and-miss and can unevenly put all the weight of my hair on a few strands which is not comfortable.

This morning I started out determined to find another solution. Went through many tutorials, with some of them *almost* working (including one with no utensils needed at all!) and others I didn't even try because I started to realize this: My hair is much thicker than the average tutorial guide's. I've never actually measured the circumference of the ponytail but I started to despair. Plus, it has been a freak summer day (got above 80 degrees!) and I was sweating slightly from all the activity.

Later on, I looked up how to make buns for thick hair, abandoning the idea of looking only for buns made without the usual hair accessories. Turns out I'm not alone, which I guess I knew all along but it is still a relief to find strangers bemoaning of the same difficulties. Most suggested that all they could find to work was the same old method I've been using. Or something even more complex and requiring sectioning hair and using bobby pins. And then, I found ...

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qP70xftdDn0)

I tried a few times, watched the video at least 3 or 4 times, and then - it worked. Now, the problem is I don't want to take it out and retry because I'm afraid it won't work again. It's so nice to have it in a good bun! But I will need to go to sleep sometime soon and having pens stuck in my head will impede that, so we shall see how much is plain dumb luck or not next time I try it (tomorrow). But for now - bliss, or something like it.

It's been quite some time since I wrote a post answering "So how's life?" I started today's post with the intention of blogging (even more!) about tech hits and misses. Now I'm slightly conflicted about what to write about. *sips some tea, thinks a minute*

Well, I want to do both. I could argue that the last couple days have been largely consumed by a tech quest and therefore explaining that *would* be answering the "So how's life?" question. But I'm not quite ready to admit to geekery of that scale, so a compromise: this post will be about anything that comes to mind that is not tech-related and then I'll tackle the tech in a separate post immediately after posting this post. *sips some more tea, thinks a couple more minutes*

Work has been going well. Students get next week off for spring break but I've got hours tomorrow and next Friday. They'll be interesting (probably boring) hours but good for working on those other work projects that don't involve helping the random person who wanders up to the desk.

A short ... observation, if we will, about the people who visit the library:
Most people are easy to work with, cooperative, and eager to learn how to do or find something. They are willing to raise their voices to an appropriate level when I ask them to speak up - and almost always they recognize that I'm hearing impaired when I ask this question so they adapt other accommodating techniques (even those that attempt to sign to me I appreciate). They understand that it's not my problem if they have class in five minutes and we work together to solve the problem. They respect the attention and time I give them by not holding a different conversation on their cellphones the entire time. They don't get excessively frustrated when I don't immediately know the answer, even after explaining that I'm new this semester.

*sips some more tea*

As for what happens at home, I've gotten lazier with meal planning. For awhile, it was "pizza, pasta, I don't care - something quick," which happens every few days normally. So there hasn't been an excessive amount of experimentation or time spent in the kitchen playing with food. I don't think using up leftover hot dog and hamburger buns as grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch today exactly counts.

The big one in the last month was the char siu pork baos (I keep typing "boas"). I had tried them first last summer with Tom and Keegan at Wow Bao downtown. They're Vietnamese steamed rolls with stuffing. The last time we visited Tom and Keegan, they made homemade baos for lunch. So of course I had to try it out myself.

Char siu pork is heavily marinaded and cooked beforehand. Eating some of the pork as a main dinner dish was delicious so if you've got plenty of pork, just make it all into char siu pork. ;)

For me, most of the experimentation came from assembling the marinade and then trying not to have holes in the dough as I wrapped them around pockets of stuffing. And, surprisingly, what to do with frozen baos. Quick note: maltose is easily substituted with corn syrup.

If you read the recipes, you'll notice both call for hoisin sauce. Tom and Keegan mentioned they had a hard time finding any of this, so I was prepared to look for a substitute. I tried to use roughly the same ratios of the ingredients for hoisin sauce that are found in this recipe, but this can be difficult when dealing with things like honey and peanut butter. I did need to buy some hot sauce but I suspect this is found in a wider variety of recipes than the elusive hoisin sauce.

There's also the Chinese five spice powder, but I only needed a teaspoon of it so I wasn't too freaked out about some wild substituting. I don't remember what I ended up using - I googled a bit and then used what I could find lying around. I did get exasperated at the "double" quantities; all three recipes called for honey, soy sauce, and sesame oil. If I was going for scientifically exact, I would write up the actual amounts of each actual ingredient for those without hoisin sauce on hand. But I'm all for inexact science, at least in most recipes.

I froze most of the baos made (8 of 10) and earlier this week I suggested we have some for lunch. Then I was absolutely befuddled with what you're supposed to do with frozen ones. They had already been steamed, as was recommended by the cooking gods of the internets. So I did some more googling and no one seemed to be willing to tell me what to do with them after freezing. Finally I found three different conflicting sources with some instructions. Apparently, you can steam them by wrapping them in a paper towel and sticking them in the microwave for 30 seconds. I wanted to avoid the microwave if I could help it. Or you can let them thaw out and then steam them as you did the first time. Or you can steam them from right out of the freezer for 30 minutes - or 15 minutes. I choose the last option. After 15 minutes I split one of the four open and found the meat was still cold. I didn't have to steam them a whole half hour but at least 5 minutes more (somewhere between 20 and 25 minutes).

*notices the rest of the tea has gotten cool but drinks some more anyway*

Movies I've seen lately: "Despicable Me" was a lot of fun to watch. "Roxanne" (made in 1984 or thereabouts) is very cute. (I now pet Colin's ears and say "I love your nose, Charlie." Makes more sense when you've seen the movie.) Star Trek IV which I hadn't seen before (shocking, I know). "Seven" which Colin owns but I didn't watch until my sister decided to when she was here. We have "The Bucket List" from the library which we need to watch tonight. Still watching TV episodes of various things (Fringe, Bones, Dresden, White Collar, etc.) Hulu but not quite as much anymore and there's also VHS tapes of Monty Python's Flying Circus which I like to tweet quotes from.

*interrupted by needing dinner*

Intro to Jing

As part of my "learning about Blackboard" course, I played with Jing. While it isn't perfect - there's no version available for Linux and it is difficult to see where your mouse is when making the video - it is a great tool for those who don't want to fuss around at all with the more technical side of taking screenshots, adding comments, and making videos. And it comes both in free and pro (14.95 per year) versions.

But will I use it again? Personally, I've created very few screenshots and I've always used the "Print Scrn" button on the keyboard. When I've wanted to add more info - well, it's always been for some webpage or blogpost anyway so adding text underneath it isn't a problem.

However, this is a great thing to use for reference guides and classes I may teach in the future. I would want to know what I can do to make the mouse pointer more visible while I'm making the video though. I also had a few glitches while using the software. I would have expected the things I created to remain in the history after I closed the program and opened it later (and I could have sworn that I'd saved the first screenshot I made to the computer). Wouldn't things uploaded appear under "History" when the program automatically signed you into your account, even on a different computer? I can't even find where it's been apparently uploaded, in either the program or on the website.

Also, putting the extra bits on top of the screenshot wasn't completely fiddly-free (I learned the hard way that things overlap based on what order they were inserted and to edit something that wasn't the last thing you inserted, you have to move it to get the text configuration bar to pop up).

Video link:
http://www.screencast.com/users/deafelephant/folders/Jing/media/e16e2038-becf-4c46-8cd6-eda44e7fa0ce

Screenshot:

EDIT:
Aha! Figured it out about the missing first screenshot and how to access things uploaded. I clicked on the link for the video, then wondered if my uploads were at screencast.com. Signed in and there they were, with the appropriate links.

The embed links had height and width way too big to fit comfortably in my blog post, so I halved each of the dimensions and it's still a bit too big but much better. Blogger can't seem to upload the video from computer and I can't embed a video from someplace other than youtube.

Here's the other screenshot I'd made (I had made the one above because I thought I'd lost this one):

And here's the actual video:

Some "my life with tech" updates

I don't really feel much like writing a post but I think it's high time I did. Wait, let me go start boiling some water for tea and throwing things in the washer first.

*50 minutes later*

Okay so I did those things, including making the guest bed for Laura and Nathan who'll be here tonight and drilling a hole in the cap of my spanking brand new usb drive. Okay, technically it's a usb card reader for micro sdhc cards, but a card can live in it. It's insanely small - see specs at Amazon.com.

Some of the comments were suggesting drilling a small hole in the cap so it can also be attached to the small lanyard loop thing provided. That way, less chance of losing it (unless you lose the whole thing, and then you have other things you worry about).

I was stumped where I was going to put it. I didn't want it with any of my keys - I plan to be using it at work and since I'm not always right at the desk I don't want to leave my keys out in the open or have to unplug it every single time I was going to show a patron where a book was. My work ID was a better option but still not great. I also want to plug it into my computer at home and something less bulky and/or prettier was preferable. For someone who collected keychains while growing up there is a surprising dearth of them at this house.

Result? A beaded bracelet with a spring string that can be quickly slipped on and off the wrist. I've had the bracelet for years (I don't even remember where I got it) but haven't used it much. I like it and this is a great way to use it. It does look a little silly but it could look worse. Perhaps I'll raid my collection of keychains next time I visit my parents' house.

I've also been vigorously organizing my family history research using GRAMPS. I tried the software before and went "Bleahhh so much manual entry," but really, it's an amazing tool. The manual entry is kind of a pain but once it's in there, it's there. In GEDCOM format, no less. I love the ability to add multiple entries for the same type of event, such as two birthdates for the same person, and being able to say which one came from what source. I also enjoy how easy it is to change things and welcome the census add-on. It's far from perfect and not terribly intuitive but it's much better than writing a raw GEDCOM file. Or having a tangled mess of text files, pdfs, and other documents in a computer folder.

I should say that I attempted to use a wiki (TiddlyWiki) to organize it all for the first part of this year. But it feels like a mess, no matter how hard I try to set up and stick to a organization system. It's easier to navigate and view the source text, but the wiki document would only work on FF on my computer (not Chrome or on a Windows computer), name changes meant having to change the wiki link wherever the person was referenced, and attaching actual documents such as jpegs or pdfs is not possible (or at least I couldn't find a way to do it). I also briefly tested out many other kinds of wikis, including http://www.wikispaces.com/