kjpepper | Entries tagged with dragons

Dad is downstairs on the phone having a loud conversation with someone. Not a girlfriend, he talks to them every day, and this person he hasn't spoken to since the last couple rounds of hospital cha cha. I know because he took great glee in describing the gory details of mild heart attack #3. I shake my head. Well, it's good to hear him laugh.

A few days ago Dad and I got into a fierce row about, of all things, HDTV. Mr. Grand High Poohbah of 50 Inch Flatscreen insisted he had it, I told him he didn't. It took calling Direct TV yesterday and having them actually upgrade his cable package to include the HD channels to shut him up; his main topic of conversation right now is telling anyone who can listen about what a racket cable companies have going with HDTV packages. (It turned out that while dad had his dish and receiver upgraded, no one told him he had to buy the package as well.) I again shake my head. It's actually kinda nice having CNN in HD again though - it's somehow more fun with more screen.

I am fiercely disliking the trap of depression induced apathy I keep falling into. It's bad for everything. Productivity, work, waistline, you name it. My better days happen when I can summon up the nerve to plow relentlessly through a to-do list, my worst ones are when I look at said to-do list, say "fuck it" and spend the day eating my weight in tennis rolls. Part of what's feeding it is still being behind at work, I just need to buy a case of NOS and plow through it. But as always with me, starting is always the hard part. I'd blame my environment - there's definitely a sense of feeling trapped here going on - but I know that this is completely a all-in-Andee's-head thing... it's pretty likely the feeling will follow me wherever I happen to be. So I have to remember that overcoming that should be a now thing, not a "when I move" thing. Part of what tends to make me feel better is successful execution of projects, I just sort of need to organize everything I need to do as such, both practically and in my head. I'm always happy when I actually complete something... I just need to create a cycle of doing that, rather than the current failspiral I'm on.

Anyway, today I'm at least attempting to make into one of those plow through to-do list days... off to do that some more.

Current Mood: determined

New Weird Al video!

That's actually Ray Manzarek on keyboards, how awesome is that??

Okay, first of all, my love for Weird Al is eternal, but WTH, isn't he like 137 years old by now? how does he look exactly the same as he did when I was growing up? (okay, sans doofy glasses and moustache, BUT STILL.)

I'm starting to suspect that Mr. Yankovic might be a Friend of Bela, if you know what I mean.

Current Mood: amused

Book is done. It's not absolutely perfect, but for a first try it looks pretty damn gorgeous. I've got plenty of leftover material, so I think I'll make a couple of journals later and take pictures. Not for a while though. Also I need to find something else to do this with other than rubber cement. I spent most of today rather high, and now I've got a fierce headache.

Uneventful day otherwise...

Sleep schedule is borked - got home at 11:30 last night and stayed up until 8 am to finish the book stitching and thoroughly coat the binding in rubber cement. (Fumes are fun! Whee!) While doing so I watched Ma Vie En Rose (I see why Marion Cotillard won for it, that was quite a performance), Dangerous Beauty (*swoon* I love me a good costume porn movie), and the pilot episode of Californication (which is actually quite decent once you get over the idea that you're watching David Duchovny swear and fuck a lot and whine about it in VO). crashed, got back up at 1. Ugh, I feel like such a slug.

It's quite lovely having a craft project - I hadn't really expected to be doing anything like that until I got back to MA. I'm finding it does wonders for my disposition, not to mention it does afford the ability to catch up on movies/TV I missed. All the more reason to dig the beads out of hiding when I get settled; I have a few projects planned for that.

Dinner last night over at Ruthy's was fantastic - she made this delightfully rich sauce over whole wheat pasta. It's always fun getting to sit down to dinner with Dad and at least one other person in the family because the teasing/verbal sparring/discussion that usually arises is highly entertaining. Sort of makes me nostalgic for Friday nights when Dad would have the day off and actually be home for dinner and he and Mom would go at it. Usually over beer. Dear heavens, Mom loved herself a beer and a good debate/argument. Dad simply likes to hear himself talk, I think, lol. I got a little bit of ribbing from both sides of the table for knowing obscure bits of history off the top of my head and also for pulling my cell out of my bra when

cell23 called mid-dessert. Hey, my dress had no pockets, where else was I going to put it? (The iPod was in the other cup.) After dinner we watched Doubt, which was quite well acted, and then Dad and I went home and had a fun discussion about the role of movies in society now and fifty years ago. Always fun discussing cinematic merit with a Turner Classic Movies devotee, lol.

Nothing terribly exciting lined up for the rest of today. If the sun comes back out I may take the Hatemonger to Prospect Park. I also need to get some work they pay me for work done and if possible squeeze in something of a workout. Also running to the store. Kitty needs sugar, raisins and eggs....

Current Mood: okay

Most of them last night were bad (involving banquet tables of visibly spoiling food... ugh, I hate mold dreams) but there was one cool one about a restored antique train taking a trip across the country and one of the conductors hoped to meet up with his long lost sweetheart at some whistle stop station in the middle. He spent a good portion of the dream telling me about it while showing me how the train worked.

My alarm went off, I woke up enough to turn it off, then fell back asleep... and back to the same dream, or rather a sequel where I got a postcard in the mail from the conductor telling me that he'd indeed found his sweetie and they'd eloped. I woke up literally saying out loud "d'awwwwwww."

"That punk is either in love with his daughter or he's got a new found respect for life." I'm streaming Grosse Pointe Blank off of Netflix while I work this morning. How the hell is this movie 13 years old already? This movie is the soundtrack to my sophomore and junior years of college, thanks to

jaicat... and this is the first time I'm seeing it in widescreen. And it still makes me giggle, even though I know most of the dialog by heart. I almost want to know if Debbie and Martin made it back for their 20th.

Car is reserved for 22 - 28th. Probably not the cherry whore, but I'm hoping for one of her little sisters, like a Nissan Versa...

I've got a gold dragon finally. Thanks

karnythia!

...is friggin huge. O_o. Definitely broke in the sneakers! whew. Also, holy god, Williamsburg is full of hipsters. D: Terrifying.

I didn't get anything at the fair per se (though I did pick up another sundress from the Buffalo Exchange nearby), but I did come away with a ton of business cards for things. So in a giant note these down for later/support your not-so-local artisan post (and also in the interests of sharing), here's what I saw today.

Giant Dwarf - had these giant felt flower headbands. The red one looks rather superfantastic with the dreads.
Charlie and Sarah - Printed T-shirts and stuff with "british" vocabulary words and pictures on them; my favorite were the underpants that said "knickers"
The Cherry Box - Specifically, the plushkill forest. I think labmouse's default icon is from there.
Folded Pigs - I like the idea of repurposed dinnerware. I'm not so sure about the pieces with roaches printed on them.
Moth designs - big colorful designs on tshirts and other stuff, with a bit of arabic vocabulary printed on it too.
Ellembee - More really pretty, elegent printed t-shirts; my favorite was this one.
Fisk and Fern - printmaking, illustration and collage.
Hero Design Studio - when I move back, can someone get me this poster as a housewarming present? It's sooooooooo cute... and it glows in the dark!
Ex Libris Anonymous - journals made from used books and library discards. I actually found a couple in their bin that I used to have as a kid!
and finally The Chalkboard Tee - GUH. THIS WINS EVERYTHING. JUST GO HERE AND WATCH THE YOUTUBE.

All of this makes me really want to get my beads out of storage and crank out some of the ideas I've had past few months.

In other news, saw this guy playing the at Union Square earlier today. Its funny how many subway musicians have myspace music these days. I can't find the song he was actually singing today, but I do like "Indian." He's apparently at this point an institution on that particular L platform. Not to self, find him again and pick up a CD.

again, big thanks to

ggirl for providing the excuse to get out of the house.

Current Mood: tired

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It's still on the market. I kinda wish someone would just buy it so the listing can quit taunting me.

It's an axe to the grind/let's-be-annoyed-at-myself-and-overcompensate-for-this-by-trying-to-do-EVERYTHING kind of day. I swear, if I spent as much time DOING shit as opposed to moping about how I'm NOT doing shit, shit would get done. *sigh*

What about you?

ETA: Also: RIP David Carradine...

Current Mood: frustrated

I have nothing profound to say this morning (do I any morning?) so here, have a quote from the Addams Family Values:

Morticia: Wednesday's at that very special age when a girl has only one thing on her mind.
Camp Mother: Boys?
Wednesday: Homicide.

Current Mood: groggy

[This was supposed to have posted at 11:45 last night; don't know why it didn't]

Today was a wash in the productive department. Oh well. Tomorrow is another day.

The plastics are down, lol. You can imagine how stuffy the house was past couple of days. Even weirder, my window is open. I can't tell you how long it's been since THAT has happened. We're talking a six by four foot sash here. It's always weird how sometimes I still live under Mom's rules in subtle, unconscious ways, and while MA has turned me into enough of a natural light freak to get over the-curtains-must-stay-closed thing, I must say I never even considered opening the window. But there it is in front of me, letting in a breeze, the peculiar smell of New York in bloom, and the clear, unmuted rattle of passing Q trains in the open cut behind the house.

It's oddly quiet out there. I say odd because once the city gets above a certain temperature, it positively explodes into 24 hour noise that is only killed by pouring rain. Course everyone down here is freaking out about swine flu so I imagine that keeping folk inside.

I wonder if there's a way to get to Home Depot in Red hook on the bus from here? Apparently last summer one of the gutters backed up into the house, and the ceiling in Mom's room and the dining room got stained. I'm sick of looking at it. Really I need to revive the project of cleaning shit out and restoring. This room hasn't gotten a new coat of paint since the mid seventies. It's gonna be like pulling teeth, but I'm getting back in the mood to reopen that particular battle. Eh, who knows if it'll get done. Heat tends to make that inertia problem I have worse.

I don't know. Just kinda rambling I guess before bed.

I seem to have more or less kicked the sleep problem that had me waking up at 10 instead of my usual 6-7. Keeping the window curtains pulled back helps, but the true trick is drinking about a liter of water before bed - that'll get you up real fast in the morning. Staying up, well that's a different beast entirely.

Plan today is to stick close to home, work, read, and hide from the heat. I may venture out later on today... need to wander down Flatbush a bit later and pick up anti-treesex pills finally. Yesterday was kind of the nail in the coffin - I can't put it off anymore.

Need to revive my toodledoo. I find it incredibly funny/exasperating that not only is reorganizing my to-do list on my to-do list, but I'm procrastinating horribly from doing so.

Pills coffee breakfast now.

Current Mood: groggy

Sooo aparently Crackcave released seven (!!!) new eggs on Wednesday. Just when I thought I was totally done with dragons here these guys come. So now I'm all panting at my new batch so I can go get new ones. And I still don't have a gold one.

Yes, I'm silly, shush.

The cat is no longer terrified by DDR. Rather he will now sprawl in front of the dance pad, and occasionally take swipes at the wire connecting it to the Wii when it moves.

Dad and Imm are still amused as hell.

Click my dragons: