TBQ's LJ

Why did I crash land on the moon with my liberal arts degree???

I am told it is more joy day! I'm rather busy today - and let's pause to honor the enjoyment of my job - but I share this newly gotten icon with you as it does indeed give me joy.

*scurries off to do more work*

Zombie-tired is still with me. Not as bad as last week but even so, whee, broken brain.

On the upside I finally got the plants and mulch that I wanted to get on Saturday. The wee patch now has rosemary, lavendar, spearmint, sage, and more thyme. They have a nice layer of mulch to help keep them safe and snuggly. Hopefully they'll stay alive and it'll be a wee kitchen garden next year too!

And now I sit with the kitties and watch TV.

Thanks to bailunrui I have been made aware of Discovery Channel: Ain't Nothing Wrong With That.

*glees with geeky joy over it*

So after a recent change in meds I have been DEAD tired. I can't remember if I've told you all that before but that'll give you an idea of just how tired I am. There doesn't seem to be a concept of "too much sleep" for my body right now. Also "coherence" as I find myself doing things like putting sugar into the (thankfully empty at the time) teapot instead of my cup.

This is possibly why I thought it'd be a great idea to do some much-needed weeding yesterday, when it was hot and humid and the sun was BEATING DOWN RIGHT ON ME. In my defense it was a comparatively small patch of earth. I also wasn't out there very long (certainly not putting in the kind of time and labor it took to get all of my plants - lilac bush included - planted weeks ago). However by the time I was done with pulling weeds out I found my body doing that fun thing where it was really contemplating passing out. Like I sat down on the nearby steps because that was as far as I could go and then wondered if that was smart because they were concrete with a metal railing and neither one of those items could be described as "fluffy" or "an ideal object for your skull to meet when it gives up the fight against gravity."

But I did not pass out. I eventually felt better enough to gather up the weeds into the trash (god I wish we had a composter here) then went inside for a cold shower and Vitamin Water and doing a lot of nothing.

Today I am still zombie tired. The original plan was to go visit my grams in the hospital (bruised rib) but grams ixnayed that as she wasn't feeling up to it. On the one hand I realize that in this state I'm probably not up for the trip in anyway, and I should be glad for the free time and use it to take a nap.

On the other there is no prize for guessing if my brain is now going "You could go to the garden center for mulch and more plants and finish off the work for that patch!!!!" Or for guessing whether or not I'm able to tell if that's a bad idea.

Bunim-Murray (producers of, amongst other things, The Real WOrld) are set to take over Project Runway.

*deep breath*

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO*pays Anakin roytalties*OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

AIM conversation during What Not To Wear, wherein our hero sees writing on an outfit...

thebratqueen: "HILF"?
thebratqueen: what's the H stand for?
thebratqueen: Human?
christinenj: Hilfiger
thebratqueen: OH

Ahem. Don't mind me.

First, icon thanks to spleen_merchant (and, of course, XKCD)

Got a pedicure today. The nail polish color was "Well Red." It takes so little to amuse me.

Summer hours allowed me to take Serenity in for an oil change and AC check. This is of the good as the AC lacked C and y'all know how I don't survive well in warm.

I'm almost at my 1 year anniversary of working for Primatech. Just think, this time last year I was looking forward to the end of the previous job and nervous with anticipation about the new one! Little did I know!

( So I'm watching s2 of Shear Genius and.... )

This is the best editorial cartoon in honor of George Carlin's death that I've seen. (Link c/o muskrat_john)

The weather reports keep promising OMG THUNDER AND RAIN and none ever comes. I'm starting to develop trust issues.

It was warm here in the land of Siam. Now that I'm drying laundry outside, I look at hot days a bit differently. Before it was a sort of "Crap, hot" reaction. Now it's "Crap, hot. Well at least I can make the heat my bitch." I hung up sheets and towels and such before leaving for lunch (Japanese) followed by antiquing (beautiful and sadly expensive) and by the time I got back they were bone dry. That's pretty good service.

I also used my clothespin bag. It worked perfectly! It was just the right height to reach into as I was hanging things up and it didn't fall or anything like that while I used it. Woohoo!

In other news my Spanish lessons continue nicely. I am by no means fluent but I'm starting to recognize some things when I see them in the wild, as it were. To help encourage me I bought a copy of Freakanomics in Spanish. I imagine this is going to be extremely slow reading, but I'm proud to say I was at least able to get my way through the blurb on the back without having to hit a Spanish/English dictionary.

Summer hours are a wonderful invention and I highly recommend them. As do my cats, who feel it is only right and just that I come home early in order to snuggle with them.

I am enjoying geeky productivity at work. The sort of thing where I complete some if not all of what I'm doing and then do a happy bounce of joy at what I created.

If you know me then you don't have to ask if this involves actual bouncing.

I've come to a crossroads about dance. Due to many factors, not the least of which is the realization that it takes me longer to drive back and forth to class than I spend in the actual class (as well as a suspicion that the learning has pleateaued due to the teacher's interests and experience), I am mulling the decision to quit tribal belly dance and move on to other things. It's not an easy decision as I adore tribal (and recently bought a new skirt for it and everything!) but I also feel like my enjoyment is going to experience diminishing returns. There are some local schools that, though they do not teach belly dance, do teach some forms of dance that I am interested in. So I've sent some feelers out to get more information about those. There may not be much progress due to reduced summer hours at the schools, but at least I can get the ball rolling.

My plants are not dead yet, which is good.

The more I see of steampunk the more I think it's very shiny.

Time and weather permitting, tomorrow I will give my new clothespin bag a try.

Tonight's ep of Kathy Griffin's My Life on the D List has showed me that I am now one Kevin Bacon step closer to Kathy herself!!

Not that I can tell you how that step is taken care of due to privacy concerns, but still! EEEE!

Also I have new fabric! It is pretty. That is all.

There's nothing that makes you want to take a shower like finding out you can't take a shower.

There's nothing that makes you really really grateful that you didn't hit the treadmill like finding out that there's no hot water.

There was lukewarm water, which I used for a quick hair wash and scrubdown. I shudder to think of what it would've been like if I'd had enough pep to do a workout.

Speaking of pep and the lack therein, I hate my doctor's office SO MUCH. If I started ranting about it I would go on for pages. So suffice it to say OMGHATE. Which is probably going to be even more hate when I head over there tomorrow to pick up a new prescription. It's supposed to be written out and waiting for me at the front desk. We'll see how that turns out. (I'm going to call in advance and everything. THEN LIGHT THE PLACE ON FIRE AFTER I LEAVE.) (Kidding) (Mostly)

In happier news, I have new bras. I passed the just noticeable difference on the ones I was wearing where "fits okay" was replaced with "remove this torture device from my body and never let it darken my door - or breasts for that matter - again." Luckily there's an awesome place just down the street from where I work. I went in on my lunch break and replied "Yes, yes you can." to the woman who asked "Can I help you?" What followed was a half hour of her fetching bras for me to try on until I left with 4 that fit, felt comfortable, and actually look cute and/or sexy. (Not that I have anyone in my life looking at my bras right now, but hey - I appreciate the pretty.)

I must say if you have problems finding good bras, you may want to try this method. Granted this assumes having a good store near you (I hit up Bare Necessities) but the staff's going to know the inventory better than you do, they're going to know how to problem-solve better than you do, and plus I think mentally it's better when all you're seeing is "Here's an option for you, here's another, here's another." As opposed to searching the racks yourself and going "That's pretty... oh nothing in my size." a few thousand times before finding one thing that might fit and convincing yourself that this is probably the only bra in the entire store that even comes close to fitting, you boobular freak you. Sure I tried on maybe 10 bras and came away with 4 that fit but - I tried on ten bras. That's way more possibles than I would've found on my own.

So that was my day. Tomorrow is doctors and, thankfully, working from home.

Things of a crafty nature abound here in Siam. I come bearing pictures of said items!

( Shelves! )

( Sock! )

( Sewing! )

And that is all for now. Currently I am snuggling with kitties, and in a bit I'll toss a steak on the BBQ.

I'm sure I'm late to the party but today I saw my first variation on the theme of "Hey, doesn't that BLACK GUY know it's called the WHITE house for a reason?" At which point my head exploded. Which is good because being dead meant I didn't have to see the sentence that came after about how if Barack won then we'd all have to "learn how to talk like them" complete with examples of how "they" talk.*

Now I'm just double checking here - we all agreed that passing that kind of shit on was punishable by painful death, right? Because I'd hate to go right to death if there's a mention that pain be involved.

(* Thankfully said email was not sent directly to me. It was sent to someone else who only showed it to me as a part of a "WHAT THE FUCK ARE MY IN-LAWS ON?" conversation. But still. There it was. Without any form of irony. I've showered and yet I still don't feel fully clean.)

( Spoilers for the s2 premiere of Army Wives )

I realize I'm not breaking any new ground here but holy crud is it hot outside. Don't mind me as I stay mostly indoors. Except for when I went out to do laundry and hang my towels and such on the line (hey, that heat and sun's gotta be good for SOMETHING, damn it) and later on when I'll be firing up the BBQ and also getting towels and such off of the line.

My plants aren't dead yet, which is encouraging.

In political news, Obama's donate for the first time and have your donation matched is up to 16,649 new doners as of me writing this. They're still aiming for 20,000 so if you haven't donated before and been meaning to, now's still a great time =)

First, courtesy of amireal: Why, if you think harassment is flattering, you are stupid. Select quote:

Men who want to be with beautiful women devote their energy to winning dates with beautiful women. Men who devote their energy to aggression toward strange women enjoy winning fights with women. That’s why they’ve set up a context where she feels cornered and pressured and where their male buddies back them up.

***

In political news, thanks to Barack Obama the Democratic Party will no longer accept donations from lobbyists. Also, if you'd like to support Barack's campaign and haven't before, they're currently doing a donation match:

"If you make a $25 donation today, your gift will be matched by a previous donor who has agreed to give again. You can even choose to exchange a note with them about why you support Barack."

You can go here to take advantage of the match.

Of note: when I first heard about this at 4:30pm they were 2,000 folks shy of their goal of 10,000 new donors. I went to take a nap and now, 3 hours later, they have 11,286 (with a new goal of 20,000). That's just awesome.

YES WE CAN! YES WE CAN! YES WE CAN!